Once More, With Feeling
by Jane Harper
Summary: Band of Sisters, #1: Bartlet's re-election isn't only the business of those on the Committee.


Once More, With Feeling

Jane Harper

RATING: R for language

SYNOPSIS: Band of Sisters #1. begins late, the night of the Leadership Breakfast

ARCHIVE: ask first

DISCLAIMER: they're not mine except her, and she's very much her own woman.

He looked like ten miles of bad road when he got in that night, a little after midnight.

"Hey there."

"Hey yourself. Looks like it's been rough."

"You don't know, Toots."

"Yeah I do, it was all over the OEOB."

He nodded as he dropped into his big leather chair. "They're comin' after us. It's like being on a damn hamster wheel, running to beat hell just to stay in the same place."

She already had his quick-before-I-collapse banana blender thing in the fridge, so she grabbed the mug out of the freezer and dumped it in, then went back over and handed it to him. He drank about half of it and put the mug down on a coaster on the end table. Then he patted his lap, and she scooted over.

"I didn't want to start running again so damn soon," he muttered. "He's gonna sit down like a mule and refuse to budge."

"Then don't tell him," she said, leaning in on his shoulder.

His thumb ran up and down her arm absent-mindedly. "We're not gonna," he responded.

"We?"

"Toby and me."

"Which one of you is gonna hold the bag?"

"If I even look like I'm moving over, our cover's blown. Toby's gonna have to take the point on this one."

"You OK about that?"

"Gonna have to be."

"Loosen the reins, Irish. He hasn't let you down yet."

"Yeah he has, he fucked up big time today. And we can't afford—"

"Yeah, yeah, those amateur mistakes make you crazy. Guess what? Toby's no amateur. He's not perfect either, nor are you, or anybody else. Fix it, plod ahead."

"When did you become a politician?"

That made her laugh. "Ewwww, wash your mouth out with soap."

"OK, not a politician, but you're a quick study. Gonna be a wonderful politician's . . . " he stopped and thought for a second.

"What?" she grinned.

"Whatever," he shot back. "Not gonna paint me into that corner, woman."

"I've got good teachers."

"Thank you," he said with a smirk.

"What makes you think I'm talking about you?" She popped him in the shoulder.

"Uh huh, late night tutorials with that good-looking boss of yours."

"Yeah, it's all true. We're running off to Barbados for Valentine's Day." She kissed him on the nose, and moved back into her chair. "C'mon, let's go to bed."

When he came out of the bathroom she was sitting on the bed with the quilts turned down. He slid in and turned toward her and waited but she shook her head.

"Roll it over, fella."

"Huh?"

"I can tell from the way you're moving, you're wound up tighter'n a mainspring." She held up the plastic bottle of almond oil in her lap. "Ass up, flyboy."

He turned over on his stomach and wadded up a pillow under his head. She scooted over and straddled his back and rubbed the oil between her hands. About a minute after she started kneading at his neck he yelped. "Hey!"

"Found it," she said with a laugh.

"No shit. It and its cousin and aunts and uncles and ow!"

After ten minutes or so of vigorous and deep knot-twisting in his shoulders she began to gentle him down to sleep. Another five and he was snoring softly.

The next day she called Mallory and invited her to dinner. She was elbow-deep in falafel when the doorbell rang and she punched the intercom. "That you Mallie?"

"Yeah, I just didn't want you to think it was Dad!" She let herself in.

"You could have just come on in, hon," Sarah said.

"I know, but I didn't want you to think … I mean I didn't want you to be …" she laughed. "You know."

"You didn't want to walk in and find me half naked and expecting your father?"

"Uh, yeah." She dropped her coat on the tree and pulled a bottle of bubble-juice out of her bookbag. "What's for dinner?"

"Falafel, salad, raspberry tortes."

"Tortes? Where do you find time to bake, woman?"

"Sunday afternoons, make 'em, freeze 'em, bake 'em later. It's not like your father and I spend too many weekends cozied off somewhere together."

"Cozied? Is that a word now?" Mallory giggled.

"Yeah well you get what I mean."

She nodded and pulled two place settings out of the hutch.

Later, after dinner, the two sat in the living room, Mal in the rocking chair and Sarah on the sofa.

"You know, you shouldn't have," Mallory said, stroking the top of the quilt she held in her arms.

"Fiddlesticks," Sarah said with a smirk. "I've given up on it being a wedding present, so I figured I'd give it to you now."

"You're even beginning to sound like Dad," she laughed.

"Listen, Mal—"

"Uh oh, here comes the stick."

Sarah grinned. "Nah. I just thought you should have a heads-up. And this is just between us, your dad will tell Sam when he's ready."

Mallory swallowed hard and took a deep breath. "Is he ok?"

"Oh he's fine hon, it's nothing like that. But there's something you and I need to start gearing up for."

"Now you're confusing me, Sarah."

"Stark's boss is coming for Bartlet, Mallie, like the Grim Reaper. They've got to start running again. Now."

"Oh shit, already?" Mallory put her head in her hands.

"And you know what that means, even more than I do."

"Sarah, you've got to talk to Mom."

"Oh yeah, I'm sure she'll just be thrilled to sit and have a nice chat."

"I'm serious, she's been through this, she can tell you what to watch for."

"Mal, with all the respect due your mother, she didn't exactly pull it out in time, did she?"

Mallory sighed. "Still."

"OK, I'll talk to her, if it'll make you feel better, sweetie."

The younger woman got a twinkle in her eye and a grin on her face. "Besides, it'll make Dad crazy."

"That it will. But I need to ask you more than that."

She sighed again. "What the hell are you talking about?"

"Your Dad, Sam, everybody we love is about to jump into the grinder again. We've got to be there for them, and nobody else except us is going to be there for one another."

The light dawned. "So you want to organize us into some sort of semi-formal thing."

"Well at least a phone tree. As time goes on, we'll only have each other to hang onto. Spouses, 'special friends,' partners .. no matter what else we are, where else we work or who else we have in our lives, there'll be something that only we share. And if we don't ride it, it'll run over us. Ask your Mom."

Mallory nodded sadly. "OK. Let's do it." She got up and moved over to the sofa next to Sarah, and the two women hugged, hard.

The older woman laughed.

"What's so funny?"

"I just flashed on something."

"What?"

"Lemme see if I can remember the speech …" her eyes glazed over a little while she searched the back of her mind; then she grinned. "Yeah."

Mallory leaned back and waited.

"From this day to the ending of the world, but we in it shall be remembered—

"We few, we happy few, we band of sisters."

The two clasped arms in a warriors' handshake.


End file.
